Advantages of UV laser systems

Disadvantages of UV laser systems
  • capable of very small (> 10 micron) beam spot sizes need for in-situ argon extraction
  • ablates material rather than heating/fusing which means it will not affect argon sites immediately adjacent to current analysis
  • expensive to purchase and maintain
  • not capable of step-heating

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NMGRL UV Laser schematic

Schematic of UV Laser Head.

Components of UV Laser Head:
  1. Rear mirror/intra cavity shutter
  2. Q-switch
  3. Oscillator pumping chamber
  4. Output coupling mirror
  5. Steering mirrors
  6. Second harmonic generator
  7. Third/fourth harmonic generator
  8. HSA2 Dichroic mirror harmonic separator

 

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NMGRL UV Laser Photo Gallery

 
 
 
 

 

 

 

 

Matt Heizler optimizing the UV laser.

Periodically, the UV laser requires the replacement of the flashlamps that produce the beam. After replacement, the laser needs to be adjusted so that output power is maximized.
   

 

 

 

 

Mica flake with ablation pits.

To the left is a muscovite mica crystal. Its size is approximately 3 mm across on the short axis (left to right). Each ablation pit is approximately 100 microns square. The pit traverse helps determine the spatial argon distribution across the muscovite grain.
   

Sanidine crystal with UV beam.

Here is a sanidine crystal being analyzed by the UV beam. The purpose of this experiment is to determine the differences in argon ratios between the sanidine lattice and melt inclusions trapped within the sanidine. The beam size is approximately 100 microns square.

Courtesy: Jeff Winick
   

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Video Clip of UV Laser Ablation

To view the video, click on the button below.

Explanation: the image you will see is approximately 0.6 mm across. The substrate is a muscovite mica crystal. To the lower left of the image, three pits have been ablated by the UV laser already. The fourth pit will begin to be ablated in the center of the image when the window finishes loading. The blue light is the actual UV beam hitting the muscovite surface. It appears to be turning off and on, but it is actually pulsing at a very fast rate (the capture rate of the video source is clipping some of the frames). Each pulse vaporizes a more and more of the muscovite. After approximately 5-10 seconds, there is a perfect cube "excavated" from the mica, leaving the surrounding material untouched.

 





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